Schaff - History of the Christian Church Vol. 8 - Media Sabda Org

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This Confession was superseded by maturer statements of the Reformed
faith, but retained a semi-symbolical authority in the Church of Basel, as a
venerable historical document.
Myconius wrote the first biography of Zwingli in twelve, short chapters
(1532). f328 His other writings are not important. f329
One of his most influential successors was Lukas Gernler, who presided as
Antistes over the Church of Basel from 1656 to 1675. He formulated the
scholastic system of Calvinism, with many subtle definitions and
distinctions, in a Syllabus of 588 Theses. In connection with John Henry
Heidegger of Zürich and the elder Turretin of Geneva, he prepared the
Helvetic Consensus Formula, the last and the most rigid of Calvinistic
symbols (1675). He was the last representative of strict Calvinistic
orthodoxy in Basel. He combined with an intolerant creed a benevolent
heart, and induced the magistracy of Basel to found an orphan asylum. The
famous Hebrew and Talmudic scholars, John Buxtorf (1564–1629), his
son, John (1599–1664), and his grandson, John Jacob (1645–1704), who
adorned the university of Basel in the seventeenth century, fully agreed
with the doctrinal position of Gernler, and defended even the rabbinical
tradition of the literal inspiration of the Masoretic text against Louis
Cappel, who attacked it with great learning (1650). f330
§ 57. THE HELVETIC CONFESSIONS OF FAITH.
Niemeyer: Collectio Confess. (Hall. 1840), pp. 105–122 (Conf. Helv.
prior, German and Latin), and 462–536 (Conf. Helv. posterior).—
SCHAFF: Creeds of Christendom (New York, 6th ed. 1890), vol. I.
388–420 (history); III. 211–307 (First and Second Helv. Conf.), 831–
909 (Second Helv. Conf. in English). Other literature quoted by Schaff,
I. 385 and 399.
Bullinger and Myconius authoritatively formulated the doctrines of the
Reformed Churches in Switzerland, and impressed upon them a strongly
evangelical character, without the scholastic subtleties of a later period.
The Sixty-seven Conclusions and the two private Confessions of Zwingli
(to Charles V., and Francis I.) were not intended to be used as public
creeds, and never received the sanction of the Church. The Ten Theses of
Bern (1528), the First Confession of Basel (1534), the Zürich Consensus
(1549), and the Geneva Consensus (1552) were official documents, but